Huntley: Totally in the wrong, but completely right
As a mother of a daughter and a human being, I was revolted by Ian Huntley’s murder of two 10 year old girls. He is locked up for a sentence where it appears life will really mean life. Good. He should never be allowed to walk the streets again.
I don’t believe in the death penalty. Never have. Setting aside the awful risk of a miscarriage of justice, I simply don’t believe that the state has the right to kill a human being, except in obvious self defence. And I don’t believe in vigelante action either – although if I had been the parent of Holly or Jessica, God knows I would have wanted to kill their murderer myself.
So whilst I am horrified at the news that Ian Huntley wants to claim compensation for being attacked whilst in jail, I can’t support the tabloids and commentators like Iain Dale, who say that as a murderer Huntley has relinquished his human rights. Dale says:
I suspect many people would award a medal to the man who slit Huntley’s throat. Did prison officers turn a blind eye? Perhaps. If so, who would blame them? You’d have thought Huntley would be grateful. After all, he has twice tried to top himself. All the throat slitter was doing was trying to finish what Huntley himself had started but failed.
I have to disagree. When we send someone to prison, we are saying that we as society have higher standards of behaviour than they have shown and are punishing them and giving them time to reflect on their actions. We are not sending them to a place where there are no rules, no society. In prison there is a pecking order, a list of those crimes which are approved of and those where the perpetrators are viewed as ‘scum’. The armed robber who attempted to kill Ian Huntley has just enhanced his ‘hero’ status. Huntley is viewed as having deserved everything he got. Do we really send people to prison because we disapprove of them, only to suddenly support their moral code?
We only continue to have the moral right to try and sentence lawbreakers when we ourselves accept the rule of law. So even Ian Huntley deserves to be protected while he serves out his life sentence. That means that the police and prison officers who are paid to uphold the law must be held to account if someone is killed or injured because of their failures. Prison officers should ensure that prisoners are protected from the violent in their ranks, just as the police should outside. Neither custodian can choose who they will or won’t protect. If prison officers did ‘turn a blind eye’ to the assault on Huntley, I would certainly blame them for not doing their jobs properly.
I am also disappointed that so many people seem to think that because Huntley had attempted suicide on more than one occasion, it’s fine to try and help him on his way by slitting his throat? It’s often said that can measure the civilisation of a society by how it treats its prisoners. So whilst we condemn those countries which mete out ‘justice’ in the form of stoning, floggings and lynchings, we should reconsider why so many people believe that this form of summary justice is acceptable behind prison doors. The state doesn’t punish offenders by beating them to a pulp or slitting their throats, and boiling sugar water, so society shouldn’t believe that it can simply ‘contract out’ these punishments to criminals.
The prison service should be made to feel the consequences for failing to do their job. I dread to think what might happen in prisons if officers felt that they could do what they liked without any form of legal comeback. There were almost 16,000 assaults by inmates on their fellow prisoners in 2009, an increase of over 50% since 2000. These figures cannot be allowed to continue to rise. However I don’t believe that Huntley should receive compensation whilst he is behind bars. Why should he be able to supplement his prison ‘wages’ with a £50 per month top up for the remainder of his sentence? If he does receive any compensation, those who suffered from his criminal actions should be able to make first claim on the money.
Sometimes it’s hard to do the right thing. But we cannot afford to move away from the rule of law and leave it up to others as to who is deserving of the state’s protection. All prisoners are equal and none are more equal than others.
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